• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.9-20
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• 2013

In this paper, the rainfall elasticity of streamflow was estimated to quantify the effects of climate change on 5 river basins. Rainfall elasticity denotes the sensitivity of annual streamflow for the variations of potential annual rainfall. This is a simple, useful method that evaluates how the balance of a water cycle on river basins changes due to long-term climate change and offers information to manage water resources and environment systems. The elasticity method was first used by Schaake in 1990 and is commonly used in the United States and Australia. A semi-distributed hydrological model (SLURP, semi-distributed land use-based runoff processes) was used to simulate the variations of area streamflow, and potential evapotranspiration. A nonparametric method was then used to estimate the rainfall elasticity on five river basins of Korea. In addition, the A2 (SRES IPCC AR4, Special Report on Emission Scenarios IPCC Fourth Assessment Report) climate change scenario and stochastic downscaling technique were used to create a high-resolution weather change scenario in river basins, and the effects of climate change on the rainfall elasticity of each basin were then analyzed.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.476-488
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• 2013

Refractory Dissolved Organic Carbon (RDOC) is becoming more important index on management of water quality, water regulation as well as ecosystem management. We analyzed trends of RDOC using elasticity in the Nakdong river basin. If climate elasticity of streamflow is positive, change of streamflow can be defined by the proportional change in a climatic variable such as precipitation and temperature. Elasticity of streamflow to precipitation and elasticity of RDOC to precipitation were estimated in the present, and we also analyzed the variation of elasticity in the future using climate change scenarios, RCP 8.5/ 4.5. Mean streamflow elasticity is 1.655, and mean RDOC elasticity is 1.983. RDOC is more sensitive to precipitation change than streamflow. The variation of RDOC is directly proportion to precipitation in all scenarios, but the Load of RDOC is dependent on precipitation as well as others. There is a need for additional correlation analysis between RDOC and other factors for accurate prediction.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.822-833
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• 2010

Temperature increase due to climate changes causes change of water temperature in rivers which results in change of water quality etc. and the change of river ecosystem has a great impact on human life. Analyzing the impact of current climate changes on air and water temperature is an important thing in adapting to the climate changes. This study examined the effect of climate changes through analyzing air temperature trend for Nakdong river basin and analyzed the elasticity of air-water temperature to understand the effect of climate changes on water temperature. For analysis air temperature trend, collecting air temperature data from the National Weather Service on main points in Nakdong river basin, and resampling them at the units of year, season and month, used as data for air temperature trend analysis. Analyzing for elasticity of air-water temperature, the data were collected by the Water Environment Information system for water temperature, while air temperature data were collected at the National Weather Service point nearest in the water temperature point. And using the results of trend analysis and elasticity analysis, the effect of climate changes on water temperature was examined estimating future water temperature in 20 years and 50 years after. It is judged that analysis on mutual impact between factors such as heat budget, precipitation and evapotranspiration on river water temperature affected by climate changes and river water temperature is necessary.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.30 no.5B
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• pp.497-507
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• 2010

Climate changes affect greatly natural ecosystem, human social and economic system acting on constituting the climate system such as air, ocean, life, glacier and land, etc. and estimating the current impact of climate change would be the most important thing to adapt to the climate changes. This study set the target area to Nakdong river watershed and investigated the impact of climate changes through analyzing precipitation tendency, and to understand the impact of climate changes on hydrological elements, analyzed elasticity of precipitation-streamflow. For the analysis of precipitation trend, collecting the precipitation data of the National Weather Service from major points of Nakdong river watershed, resampling them at the units of year, season and month, used as the data of precipitation trend analysis. To analyze precipitation-streamflow elasticity, collecting area average precipitation and long-term streamflow data provided by WAMIS, annual and seasonal time-series were analyzed. In addition, The results of this study and elasticity, and other abroad study compared with the elasticity analysis and the validity of this study was verified. Results of this study will be able to be utilized for study on a plan to increase of flood control ability of flooding constructs caused by the increase of streamflow around Nakdong river watershed due to climate changes and on a plan of adapting to water environment according to climate changes.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
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• v.43 no.10
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• pp.851-864
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• 2010

We investigated the sensitivity of Korean streamflows to climate variation. Historical dam inflows and climate data for eight multi-purpose dam sites were collected and examined to determine key factors affecting streamflow change. The results show that annual streamflow primarily responds to change in precipitation rather than temperature. However, the combination of less precipitation and high temperature induces a more serious decrease in streamflow than does similar precipitation and with low temperature. This result indicates that Korean water resources could be more vulnerable to drought due to increasing temperature caused by global warming. To estimate spatial differences in climate sensitivity, we also calculated climate elasticity for 109 mid-size watersheds using streamflow simulated by the Precipitation Runoff Modeling System (PRMS). Climate elasticity ranges over 1.5~1.9, indicating that a +20% increase in annual precipitation leads to a +30~+38% increase in annual streamflow.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.18 no.12
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• pp.605-612
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• 2017

Climate change affects the natural ecosystem and human socioeconomic activities by acting on various constituents such as the atmospheric, oceanic, biological, and land constituents of the climate. Predicting the impacts of ongoing climate change will be an important factor in adapting to the climate of the future. In this study, precipitation-streamflow elasticity analysis of the Nakdong River area was conducted using the RCP 4.5 scenario developed by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). Precipitation and streamflow in the Nakdong River area was analyzed using monthly, seasonal, and yearly data. Results found that the climate would become very humid climate by 2100. Results of this study can be applied to adaptation of climate change, management of water resources and efficient utilization of hydraulic structures.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.830-840
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• 2011

Climate change has been settled as pending issues to consider water resources and environment all over the world, however, scientific and quantitative assessment methods of climate change have never been standardized. When South Korea headed toward water deficiency nation, the study is not only required analysis of atmospheric or hydrologic factors, but also demanded analysis of correlation with water quality environment factors to gain management policies about climate change. Therefore, this study explored appropriate monthly rainfall elasticity in chosen 41 unit watersheds in Nak-dong river which is the biggest river in Korea and applied monitored discharge data in 2004 to 2009 with monthly rainfall using Thiessen method. Each unit watershed drew elasticity between water temperature and water quality factors such as BOD, COD, SS, T-N, and T-P. Moreover, this study performed non-linear correlation analysis with monitored discharge data. Based on results of analysis, this is first steps of climate change analysis using long-term monitoring to develop basic data by Nak-dong river Environmental Research Center (Ministry of Environment) and to draw quantitative results for reliable forecasting. Secondary, the results considered characteristic of air temperature and rainfall in each unit watershed so that the study has significance its various statistical applications. Finally, this study stands for developing comparable data through "The 4 major river restoration" project by Korea government before and after which cause water quality and water environment changes.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.296-306
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• 2021

Elasticity is a statistical technique that interprets the changing pattern of another variable according to a change in one variable as a quantitative numerical value and provides more information than correlation analysis and is widely used in climate change research. In this study the elasticity was calculated and sensitivity analysis was performed using air temperature and water quality data of the major tributaries of the Nakdong River. In addition the confidence interval for the elasticity was calculated using the T-Test and the validity of the elasticity was examined. The strength of elasticity shows high strength in the order of summer>fall>spring>winter and the direction shows regional characteristics with both negative and positive elasticity. After performing hierarchical cluster analysis on monthly observation data they were classified into 5 clusters and the characteristics of each cluster were visually analyzed using a parallel coordinate graph. The direction and intensity of the air temperature elasticity show regional characteristics due to the relatively high population density and complex influencing factors such as sewage treatment plants, small-scale livestock houses and agricultural activities. In the case of TP it shows great regional variability according to the circulation of nutrients in the ecosystem caused by algae growth and death according to temperature changes. Since the air temperature elasticity of the major tributaries of the Nakdong River is over weak and is valid at the significance level of 5%, it was analyzed that there is a change in water quality according to the air temperature change.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.585-600
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• 2011

South Korean central government has launched the first comprehensive climate change policies in 1999, and they have been renewed every three year. The third policies ended in 2007. However, it is quite rare to analyze whether the climate change policies are effective against climate change. In this context, this paper aims at analyzing the effectiveness of climate change policy which was launched for seven years from 1999 to 2007 in South Korea. The effectiveness analysis of policy can be done in terms of the individual policy and/or all policies being synthesized as a comprehensive unit. Employing the latter methodology, this paper analyzed the effectiveness on the basis of economic growth as independent variable, greenhouse gas emission as dependent variable, and energy use and its process as intervening variable. Seven analytic indicators covering the three variables were selected on the basis of two points in time before and after climate change policy having been launched. The seven indicators were analyzed in terms of three aspects. They were the change in the state of each indicator, the effectiveness of climate change policy from 1999 to 2007, and the effectiveness process from 1999 to 2007. The effectiveness process was analyzed in terms of the relational context and its flow processing path. Economic growth was advanced remarkably with increase in the total consumption of energy. As a result, greenhouse gas emission increased. However, energy efficiency increased with significant decrease in energy intensity, carbon intensity, and energy elasticity. The expansion of new and renewable energy over total energy supply was not effective significantly on the decrease in greenhouse gas emission. The processing path of climate change policy being effective advanced toward increase in energy efficiency through energy intensity rather than toward sustainable development. Such a way of the effectiveness of climate change policy implies that most policies focused on adaptation rather than on mitigation.

• Journal of Wetlands Research
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.178-186
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• 2020

In this study, the elasticity was calculated and sensitivity analysis was performed using air-water temperature data of the major tributaries of the Nakdong River. We developed a nonparametric elasticity analysis technique capable of estimating the confidence interval for elasticity and verifying the hypothesis, and examined its applicability compared to the existing method using the median value. It is analyzed that the elasticity of winter is low and the elasticity of summer and autumn is high, so that the fluctuation of water temperature and water quality according to the fluctuation of air temperature is large. The spatial elasticity tends to be low in the Geumho River area, which is influenced by artificial factors such as sewage treatment plant effluent, small and medium-sized livestock wastewater, and small-scale factory wastewater. Since the elasticity of major tributaries of the Nakdong River is over weak and is reasonable at a significance level of 5%, it was analyzed that the air-water temperature fluctuation caused by climate changes is large.